Firefox 3 crashing more on Tablet PCs. Known bug and potential fix
Got a note from good friend Jordan today and I think it explains why I'm seeing Firefox 3 crash a half-dozen times daily on my Samsung Q1UP. Based on his conversations with the Mozilla folks and the related Bugzilla info, there appears to be a known issue with Firefox 3 and Tablet PCs (both XP and Vista). That could explain why many folks have the browser running rock-solid, while others, like Jordan and his X61, are fighting with constant crashes.
I've just installed the latest beta candidate of Firefox 3.0.1 where this particular issue is addressed and since I'm still not using client applications other than the browser, I should know in a few hours if this build is any better. Worst case: I can always go back to the production version of FF3 if the issue isn't fixed or other issues are introduced. Remember this is a beta candidate, so caveat emptor! Thanks for the tip, Jordan!
Oddly enough, on my M700 tablet at work, I have a pretty rock-solid experience, but at home my R10 crashes about like you describe your Q1UP. I may try the beta out at home over the weekend.
Posted by: GoodThings2Life | July 11, 2008 at 12:13 PM
My hp 6910p is in continual crash mode - at least 10 times/day. Hope it's all resolved soon.
Posted by: scott | July 11, 2008 at 12:31 PM
At least once a day Firefox will just close, no error message, on my Tosh M700 with Vista.
Will give the beta link a try!
Posted by: Gavin Miller | July 11, 2008 at 12:53 PM
Thanks so much for this. Mine crashes six or seven times a day. I've tried everything (disabling extensions, etc). I have a fujitsu t4125 tablet. I'll keep my fingers crossed that this works. At least I know that I'm not alone...
Posted by: jen | July 11, 2008 at 12:56 PM
I got so sick of the crashes on my tx2500, I switched back to Firefox 2 last night. My FF3 was crashing at least 5 times a day. The majority of my crashes were gmail related.
Posted by: TN | July 11, 2008 at 01:12 PM
same here w/ gmail on my hp tx 2000. cant wait to hear the fix!
Posted by: mike | July 11, 2008 at 01:16 PM
FWIW: an hour-and-a-half of constant use after the install and all is well. No crashes yet. Too early to form a long-term conclusion, but this looks promising. I'll report back in later today as well.
Posted by: Kevin C. Tofel | July 11, 2008 at 01:24 PM
I get crashes all the time using Gmail on my TX2000. I have been getting so frustrated with it I have been using Opera most of the time now, lol.
Posted by: Greg | July 11, 2008 at 01:37 PM
Yep...my Tosh R15...rock solid on older Firefox, crashes 5-10 times a day. THANKS for your efforts to get ur readers back up.
Posted by: Al | July 11, 2008 at 01:42 PM
I hope this helps some people out. FWIW, I was crashing several times an hour--sometimes twice within five minutes--but since I installed the beta last night I've only had one crash.
Posted by: Jordan Running | July 11, 2008 at 03:23 PM
Oh, by the way, the credit for tracking down my problem and suggesting the fixe should go to the brave individual(s) who man the @firefox_answers account on Twitter. After I complained about my crashes on Twitter to nobody in particular, @firefox_answers sent me a reply out of the blue and after a few exchanges seemed to nail down the problem. Great service, and free!
Posted by: Jordan Running | July 11, 2008 at 03:27 PM
That's odd. I have been using FF3 on my Q1UP with no problems at all. I can't even think of any time that it has mysteriously crashed.
Posted by: Manny | July 11, 2008 at 03:27 PM
Wow. My troubles with FF3 while no one else had make a lot of sense now. I'd never would have thought it had something to do with the tablet (X61 T). Thanks for the hint!
Posted by: Achim | July 11, 2008 at 04:59 PM
We had a similar disability / accessibility (and thus Tablet) related issue last year in Firefox 2 (see https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=383623). We need to keep this in mind when Tablet-related bugs come up.
Posted by: Mickey Segal | July 11, 2008 at 05:02 PM
I wish it just crashed on my desktop - instead mine freezes not just Firefox, but just about everything using the internet connection. Can't even get to sites with IE. Have firefox.exe running also when Firefox is closed. Best soln I've seen online is to use SysInternals ProcessExplorer. Hopefully it will at least allow me to kill the process next time. (I get access denied normally, so I'm stuck otherwise and even a shutdown doesn't proceed normally.)
Posted by: Bob Russell | July 11, 2008 at 06:05 PM
took me a while to figure out i needed this one: firefox-3.0.1.en-US.win32.installer.exe
Posted by: VictorE | July 11, 2008 at 06:09 PM
I've been getting at least a half-dozen crashes a day on my Tx2000. When I uninstalled the Better Gmail extension, that calmed it down a bit, but I've still had 3 today.
I was thinking it was only me, but I guess this must explain it.
Posted by: Jonathan Balkind | July 11, 2008 at 06:09 PM
My Motion M1300 suffered from freezing Firefox 3. However, I tried the various fixes suggested, and disabling the surf protection feature of AVG seemed to have fixed it.
Posted by: Sherry | July 11, 2008 at 08:30 PM
I've also seen lots of crashing. I don't have a tablet PC, but I think the tablet functions were enabled by my Wacom Intuos3 drivers. I'm on Vista.
Posted by: Nick Marques | July 11, 2008 at 10:31 PM
TX 2000 (vista) working great with new beta. Mind you, I never once thought about going back to IE
Posted by: stewall | July 11, 2008 at 11:46 PM
what a pain to read so many comments about the crash, but it's a relief to see that you're not alone...i went back to FF2 because it crashed uncountable times on my vista tx2120...
i'll give this beta a try...
THANKS A LOT FOR T HIS VERY USEFUL POST!
Posted by: fab | July 12, 2008 at 12:54 AM
I am having random crashes with ff3 mainly with gmail and google/ig (and other sites too) at least two to three times a day. That's on my LG C1.
Posted by: radpilot | July 12, 2008 at 04:46 AM
THANK YOU! My Firefox 3 has been crashing non-stop and I was really worried I would have to go back to IE.....*shudders*.
Posted by: Minda | July 12, 2008 at 08:44 AM
Big props go to Jordan and the Mozilla team because I haven't had a single crash yet on the UMPC since installing this yesterday. w00t!
Posted by: Kevin C. Tofel | July 12, 2008 at 08:46 AM
actually it would be interesting to know why in the first place this happened to tablet devices...i'm using xp and vista on different computers, non of them tablets and never ever had crashes...that's to..strange
Posted by: fab | July 12, 2008 at 09:23 AM
I've been facing continuous crashes on my X61 for several months now - it would be *so* great if that dark chapter was at an end now. Up to now, reinstalling FireFox, add-ons and extensions did not help at all. Keep your fingers crossed...
Posted by: Joshua | July 13, 2008 at 10:36 AM
No further crash - this must be heaven! :)
Posted by: Joshua | July 14, 2008 at 01:51 PM
I got an X61T and my Firefox Beta 3 was all good until I upgraded to the ver. 4 update - since then it kept crashing every 20-30 minutes until I gave up and now switched to Avant - don't know if I'll go back to Firefox once it's fixed, they got a lot of problems with my native language(Hebrew).
Posted by: Jay | July 16, 2008 at 03:28 AM
Firefox 3.0.1 is crashing on me about 5 times a day ... I'm running XP on a desktop w/ a P IV ... the older version didn't crash ... the new version SUCKS!!!!
Posted by: Ben | August 10, 2008 at 03:27 PM